Green Phantom

[Zikofski]

okay no real news to tell of apart from the Nymphaea lotus bulb has come in stock and i hum n hummed and i decided to buy it i eill squeeze it in some where thinking on the left and it will give some shade for that side. anubias may like that.

also i remember someone mentioned the lid of mine may bow and it is, I'm not sure whats causing the bow, its not the lights as they don't give of any heat. and it was bowing before i turned the lights off so maybe the heat of the water now what thickness of clastic is required to prevent bowing? 6mm 10mm? i have no idea i think what i have already is 3mm i think

 

[meleftone]

I started off reading your stand build journal, then your 330L Journal now this and can say that I am inspired to fully committed to completely rescaping my 110L no more than ever.

 

[Zikofski]

thank you Meleftone i hope you enjoyed your rescape and feel free to post a pic love to see it here
 
okay time for an update so my second week with this tank and i have just completed my 2nd water change, well what can i say one plant in particular has out grown my tank already BUT i am going to give it a week and see how it goes outside and inside the tank il post a pic later on once the lights come on after the water change, most plants have melted which is good my DHG IS GROWING 

 

 

  yes finally i see runners growing above substrate for these so i hope they will below too, i have not had a single plant die fully yet altho i am starting to get some algae i blame two things for this, flow it only seems to be on the left hand side of the tank and surprisingly only on vallis so i recon its a mix of flow and because its a hair algae i think my increase in Ammonia within the tank is also a contributing factor. so far i am not doing any major changes to the tank as its new i want consistency so I am keeping the lights co2 and fert all dosing normally and during my water changes i try to remove as much of the hair algae as i can, and maybe look at the flow issue later on maybe make a spray bar to go along the back so i get a more even flow around the tank that could be a possibility your opinions on this would be great.
 
so another little note the tank is in the middle of a stealth cycle so far i have 1mg ammonia inside the tank i had 0.5 last week so thats slowly rising, my nitrite is also on the rise thats now at 2mg/l was 1mg/l last week so the cycle is getting there is i am getting an increase in nitrite, also my nitrate is increasing BUT this could be because of ferts as i do add that to the tank, but that is now at 50mg/l instead of 20mg/l last week, il do a test after the water change to check the values before and after and then il test again next monday before the next water change, oh and another thing i have a SNAIL!! 

  well two to be precise i removed them as soon as i saw them no idea how they got in as i cleaned my plants well but they snuck in only tinny fellas but they are now gone hopefully no more i don't want a snail problem in my tank
 
okay thank you for reading and following i shall post some pics in the following days  

 

[bluesword23516]

Hope the cycle ends soon! I would love to see fish! 
Snails are a serious pain in the booty. I search each plant individually and sometimes i still get them, so I feel your pain.  

 

[Zikofski]

thnx blue

 
okay i found another snail today and got a picture of it

 
also i needed to trim my plants so i gave a few away to liamhuckle & malfunction they are now sent and i hope they arrive nicely

so here is the reason to why i needed to make a trim to the tank 

 
before the trim

 
after the trim



 
okay now for those who don't know how to or want to know how to trim plants stem plants in particular all i did was cut them around 2" to 3" above the substrate as i want them to fill out the back this will hopefully make them grow a few more stems instead of being the one. i also cut the stem at an angle to help growth i think thats correct here is a picture to demonstrate what i did
 

 
and as the final picture i also noticed my bulb that broke away from the main plant has started growing its own shoot again which i am so happy for

 
thank you again for reading and i hope you continue to enjoy this journal and watching my tank grow

 

[Zikofski]

okay over night algae seems to have taken its hold on the tank a little more every rock there is hair algae growing from it and i now have diatoms on the from glass so i am doing a 4 day black out till monday no light no co2 no ferts till then. il do a 100% water change as close to as i can get take out a lot of the algae clean the sides fully and fill her back up and hopefully that will help quell the algae also on a lighter note my ammonia has stayed at 0 for a day but my nitrite is still 2ppm so i shall monitor this over the coming days, i ordered some ammonia so i can cycle properly and check that my cycle has fully finished and is ready for fish  

 

[LboroSlider]

Hi Zikofski,
 
I stumbled across your post whilst researching building a aquarium stand.
The tank & stand look great, especially now it's planted.
 
I'm starting to build a stand for my 120ltre tank, but I'm hoping to build a 60ltr sump in the bottom as well.  Your posts have given me some great ideas and insights.
 
I couldn't help but notice that you're in the RAF, which squadron are you with?
 
Cheers
 
Dale

 

[Zikofski]

Thank you Lboro and sadly i left the RAF now but i was with 90SU TCW 2 Sqn
 
just a quick update after speaking with TTA and getting some more advice on starting a tank planted, i have decided to stop the black out altho it worked, all the diatoms had disappeared and the hair algae looks very thing and fragile still 0 ammonia 2ppm nitrite so i did a 100% water change but at the same time i dod a HUGE clean up of the plants as i noted a problem now i think this is a fert deficiency almost all types of plants are showing signs of a deficiency il post another section on this in the plated section so il see what the response is to that i stopped dosing ferts on 3rd of July it is now 5th and i am already seeing huge deficiency i also noticed the crypts have altered there positions which is interesting to notice, before they where droopy and close to the substrate but today they are stiff and stretch up tall i guess trying to look for that all Important sunlight so with only 2 days of no light no co2 no ferts it has been interesting to see how the plants have reacted but the biggest disappointment is i think the lack of light has kinda killed off my DHG some what 50 to 80% of it has gone yellow, maybe it is recoverable or not i don't know, its more the older growth the new growth is still green and looking strong. pictures to come.

 

[LboroSlider]

Have you got a UV steriliser built into the system?
I found mine particularly effective to kill off any algae blooms.
 
Are you still based in the North East after you left the RAF?  
I'm in Newcastle and I'm trying to find some good stockists.  Where are you planning on getting your livestock from?

 

[Zikofski]

i have but i don't know how well its working tbh it will only kill water born algae so algae that grows on stuff will sadly still grow, the one i have is built into the filter and dosnt work in my eyes there not really worth it for tropical tbh
 
and yes but I'm more north west now skipton other side of leeds but i will get my stock from maidenhead aquatics leeds south as they are my closest and stock well and look very good quality VERY good quality in my eyes, there is also one north leads but never been to that one yet

 

[Malex530]

Do you know what kind of fish you are getting? Looks really good Z! 

 

[Zikofski]

thnx and yes i do, i will bet getting one pleco, being a blue eyes bn pleco L144
 
then il be getting a few celestial pearl danio maybe 12 or more
 
and for the lower substrate side i feel a type of corydoras undecided on what type to get yet
 
okay well its been  a while since i last updated this post, but not much has happened just combatting the algae inside the tank, the black out actually did help but the algae came back strong so my lighting is down to 4hr a day i am not dosing any ferts but i am still pumping in the co2, and over the last few days algae has slowed down, i am also been doing daily water changes and its all helping. i will be getting an assassin snail from Ch4rlie and i think il be getting the first set of fish in a few weeks time, with the plants they are all doing good, the DHG did not like the black out and 90% has died off but i did trim them down and new growth is growing be it slowly with only 4hr of light once tank is more mature and il increase the lights

 

[Zikofski]

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 
I HAVE FISH!!!! i went out yesterday and bought 1 Blue eyed Orange BN pleco, and 6 Celestial Pearl Danio, put them in last night and this morning no dramas so far all seem happy and swimming  together looking at the size of the tank and the fish i think i may make this a more species tank for them i think i can happily fit near 20 in this tank, keep the 1 BN as that is such a beautiful pleco but i am thinking about getting some amano shrimp to combat this algae
 
okay so here is the tank as the moment shame the DHG melted back during the black out but its growing back slowly sorry for the pots of cuba there for my new tank but i can't set that up yet as I'm waiting on parts for it i was all due to come yesterday but didn't

but as you can see the difference from my sig picture the reds are starting to show through from the amazon swords and the bulb plant has grown well
here is the sig in comparison

 
 
okay fish time firstly the CPD's


 
now my fav in the world at the moment <3



 
sadly i can't seem to get a pic of the CPD's so il give it a few days maybe they will settle and i can get a better pic of them, if all goes well il get 6 more next week
 
thnx for reading
-ziko

 

[bluesword23516]

Gorgeous Pleco! I have never seen the Celestial Danios before, they look really nice.  You have a fabulous tank! 

 

[TallTree01]

Hey... How come I can never find any orange eyed Plecoes?
Beautiful tank though Zik.